I'm changing. I can feel it.
Do I blame Ivan? I guess so. Maybe that's not fair. I shouldn't blame others for the things that happen inside of me.
Maybe I'm not becoming something new. Even though it feels that way sometimes, and that frightens me. Maybe I'm returning to what I used to be. That's a far more comfortable thought. Maybe I'm going back to who I was before everything went to shite. Before he abandoned me and I got hurt and sick and lost my mind for a while. Right on the heels of everything that happened with him and him. Fecking men. What use are they, besides making you insane and keeping your bed warm?
Where are the men like Pa? Gentle and kind and hard-working and honest and good-humored. Is it any wonder Ma fell for him?
Well, feck, now I'm realizing that Ivan is a lot like that.
Dammit.
Nathan, too. He's a bit grumpier at times, but not towards me. I think I only recall one time he really snapped at me. And gods know, I can forgive anyone a single snap, with the way I mouth off sometimes. It's funny... he's far more like me than Ivan is. By all accounts, I should have fallen for him instead. Maybe it could have gone that way, if Ivan had never come along? I'll never know now! Unless Ivan goes away... but he's promised he won't. And he'd better not.
I hate how much I...
I can't write it.
He says I'm worthy of love. I don't know why he thinks so. I don't know why I don't think so. I never questioned Pa and Ma's love. Or Tara's. That seems forever ago now. It wasn't until things started to go wrong. So terribly wrong. Then I began to doubt myself. To hate myself. To lose myself.
Gods, I was so happy back then! So stupidly happy! Every day was sunlight and laughter and lovemaking and drinking and hunting.
Can I go back to being that way? So free, so light. No shadows in my head.
Who knows? I sure don't.
Don't ignore your gut anymore, Narys. Follow it. Always follow it. Listening to other people tell me what I should do or what I should think or what I should be has never led me right.
But don't forget that your gut isn't your heart. Don't follow that. At least not all the time. It's fickle and wild and will make you do things you regret come the morning.
